{"id":10819,"date":"2021-05-22T16:30:09","date_gmt":"2021-05-22T16:30:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/?p=10819"},"modified":"2021-05-22T16:19:31","modified_gmt":"2021-05-22T16:19:31","slug":"use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions","title":{"rendered":"Use data to make the right decisions"},"content":{"rendered":"

Africa-Press<\/a> – South-Africa<\/a>. <\/strong><\/span>Jikku Joseph<\/p>\n

Change is inevitable \u2013 in every industry. It\u2019s how businesses adapt to change that leads to success or failure.<\/p>\n

But adapting means rethinking how decisions are made, and anyone in business knows just how hard it is to consistently make the right decisions: You can\u2019t hide your head in the sand like an ostrich, but you also can\u2019t take a radical turn and risk everything on a whim.<\/p>\n

So, how do you make informed decisions that will create or capitalise on new opportunities, while still allowing the business to benefit from existing operations? How do you predict and plan for future trends \u2013 real trends, not pie-in-the-sky theories?<\/p>\n

The answer is data \u2013 harnessing bits and bytes to give us information that we didn\u2019t know about, or hadn\u2019t thought about in a particular way. In the past, this was easier said than done: Collecting, formatting and analysing data used to be an arduous and time-consuming task.<\/p>\n

Thankfully, advancements in technology have made this process easier and more powerful than ever before.<\/p>\n

Here are four ways that data can be used to make your business more agile.<\/p>\n

You\u2019ll know more about your customers. How much are your customers spending? Where are they spending? Harnessing transactional data can answer those questions. Locally, banks and fintechs are using artificial intelligence (AI) to make sense of consumer spending data.<\/p>\n

A business could, for example, see where else its customers (as a group) are shopping or where competitors\u2019 successful stores are located.<\/p>\n

You\u2019ll prevent unconscious bias (if you\u2019re careful). We\u2019re all guilty of making decisions based on personal beliefs and prejudices \u2013 something that psychologists call \u2018unconscious bias\u2019. Unfortunately AI systems are trained on historic data which could include social inequalities or biased human decisions.<\/p>\n

This can be highly problematic in an organisation where one uses AI systems to make decisions. One way we can prevent biased algorithms is to involve more individuals in the algorithm development process. To do this, it is important to present the training data in a way that any person in any department can interpret and understand, whether they\u2019re a data analyst or not.<\/p>\n

This allows more people in more areas of your business to contribute to ensuring that the predictive algorithms are built to be predictively powerful, while accounting for known biases.<\/p>\n

You\u2019ll be more cost-efficient. How do you decide which areas of your business might benefit from better marketing or other interventions, or which areas might need to be reined in or even discontinued? Good data can help.<\/p>\n

It is important to find those measures that will be early indicators of success or failure, called lead indicators. For example, a company selling a product online could use the number of site visits coming from organic search engine traffic to determine whether there is demand for what it\u2019s selling.<\/p>\n

Objective information like this can be tremendously useful when you\u2019re making tough decisions that affect costs within your business.<\/p>\n

You\u2019ll know what\u2019s coming. Businesses that monitor consumer trends will be ahead of their competition. With useful data and\/or predictive AI systems at your disposal, you can better track trends, spot opportunities and create meaningful customer experiences.<\/p>\n

Companies like Facebook\u2019s $1 billion acquisition of Instagram in 2012 was made based on Facebook\u2019s own data that showed an explosion of Instagram users who were sharing images with their Facebook accounts.<\/p>\n

Netflix uses predictive models not only to recommend personalised choice but also to determine the new content that it creates that we will want to watch.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a saying that the only thing constant in life is change. The Covid pandemic has proved just how true this is. If you can harness all the data at your disposal to inform your business decisions, you will be far better positioned to cope with an uncertain future.<\/p>\n

Jikku Joseph is managing director at 22seven.<\/b><\/p>\n

*The views expressed here are not necessarily those of IOL or of title sites.<\/b><\/p>\n

BUSINESS REPORT ONLINE<\/b><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Africa-Press – South-Africa. Jikku Joseph Change is inevitable \u2013 in every industry. It\u2019s how businesses adapt to change that leads to success or failure. But adapting means rethinking how decisions are made, and anyone in business knows just how hard it is to consistently make the right decisions: You can\u2019t hide your head in the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":10818,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,5,8],"tags":[274,315,275],"class_list":["post-10819","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-economy","category-homepage-english","tag-africa-press","tag-africa-press-south-africa","tag-south-africa-2"],"yoast_head":"\nUse data to make the right decisions - South Africa<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Jikku Joseph Change is inevitable \u2013 in every industry. It\u2019s how businesses adapt to change that leads to success or fai ...\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Use data to make the right decisions\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Jikku Joseph Change is inevitable \u2013 in every industry. It\u2019s how businesses adapt to change that leads to success or fai ...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"South Africa\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/AfricaPressTunisiaa\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2021-05-22T16:30:09+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/sites\/31\/2021\/05\/img-60a92eea0abd4.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"720\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"405\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"cfeditoren\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb\"},\"headline\":\"Use data to make the right decisions\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-05-22T16:30:09+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions\"},\"wordCount\":682,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/sites\/31\/2021\/05\/img-60a92eea0abd4.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Africa Press\",\"Africa Press-South-Africa\",\"South-Africa\"],\"articleSection\":[\"all news\",\"economy\",\"homepage-english\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions\",\"name\":\"Use data to make the right decisions - South Africa\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/sites\/31\/2021\/05\/img-60a92eea0abd4.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-05-22T16:30:09+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb\"},\"description\":\"Jikku Joseph Change is inevitable \u2013 in every industry. It\u2019s how businesses adapt to change that leads to success or fai ...\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/sites\/31\/2021\/05\/img-60a92eea0abd4.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/sites\/31\/2021\/05\/img-60a92eea0abd4.jpg\",\"width\":720,\"height\":405,\"caption\":\"Use data to make the right decisions\"},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Use data to make the right decisions\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/\",\"name\":\"South Africa\",\"description\":\"Just another Africa News Agency Sites site\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb\",\"name\":\"cfeditoren\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7417380fa9e23b5c57fdbfdaf3fdf92ee478f759a084addda5faa3732853e74a?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7417380fa9e23b5c57fdbfdaf3fdf92ee478f759a084addda5faa3732853e74a?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"cfeditoren\"}}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Use data to make the right decisions - South Africa","description":"Jikku Joseph Change is inevitable \u2013 in every industry. It\u2019s how businesses adapt to change that leads to success or fai ...","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Use data to make the right decisions","og_description":"Jikku Joseph Change is inevitable \u2013 in every industry. It\u2019s how businesses adapt to change that leads to success or fai ...","og_url":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions","og_site_name":"South Africa","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/AfricaPressTunisiaa","article_published_time":"2021-05-22T16:30:09+00:00","og_image":[{"width":720,"height":405,"url":"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/sites\/31\/2021\/05\/img-60a92eea0abd4.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"cfeditoren","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"cfeditoren","Est. reading time":"3 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions"},"author":{"name":"cfeditoren","@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb"},"headline":"Use data to make the right decisions","datePublished":"2021-05-22T16:30:09+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions"},"wordCount":682,"commentCount":0,"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/sites\/31\/2021\/05\/img-60a92eea0abd4.jpg","keywords":["Africa Press","Africa Press-South-Africa","South-Africa"],"articleSection":["all news","economy","homepage-english"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions","url":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions","name":"Use data to make the right decisions - South Africa","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/sites\/31\/2021\/05\/img-60a92eea0abd4.jpg","datePublished":"2021-05-22T16:30:09+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb"},"description":"Jikku Joseph Change is inevitable \u2013 in every industry. It\u2019s how businesses adapt to change that leads to success or fai ...","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/sites\/31\/2021\/05\/img-60a92eea0abd4.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/sites\/31\/2021\/05\/img-60a92eea0abd4.jpg","width":720,"height":405,"caption":"Use data to make the right decisions"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/use-data-to-make-the-right-decisions#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Use data to make the right decisions"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/","name":"South Africa","description":"Just another Africa News Agency Sites site","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb","name":"cfeditoren","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7417380fa9e23b5c57fdbfdaf3fdf92ee478f759a084addda5faa3732853e74a?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7417380fa9e23b5c57fdbfdaf3fdf92ee478f759a084addda5faa3732853e74a?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"cfeditoren"}}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10819","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/84"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10819"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10819\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10818"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10819"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10819"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10819"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}